On Saturday (October 23), Vancouver residents are scheduled to gather at City Hall and join likeminded people in London in a candlelight vigil aimed at shining light on hate crimes.

Ryan Clayton, a facilitator for Gab Youth Services, an arm of Qmunity that works with LGBT youth, told the Straight that while it's Vancouver's LGBTQ Advisory Committee that is spearheading the event, the plan is to make an inclusive stand against hate crimes in Vancouver and around the world.

“We’ve seen hate crimes against women and people of low socio-economic status in the Downtown Eastside, we’ve seen hate crimes in the form of gay-bashings against gay and lesbian men and women, and huge amounts of hate crimes against transgender people,” Clayton said in a telephone interview. “This will give Vancouver a chance to be a leader and really say, ”˜This is unacceptable in our city,’ and maybe that will start things changing everywhere else.”

Called Day Against Hate Crimes, Clayton recounted that the idea for the rally originated a year ago in London after Ian Baynham, a 62-year-old gay man, was killed by a group of homophobic youth.

The organizers of the vigil held in response to Baynham’s murder called themselves 17-24-30, which, instead of relating to a homophobic crime, is taken from the dates that a man carried out attacks in 1999 in an attempt to start a race war in Britain.

Clayton explained that an inclusive event like Saturday’s is especially important for Vancouver because when a homophobic attack has occurred in this city by an ethnic minority, the trend has been for a backlash against that group that can be just as hateful as the original attack.

“So we are trying to cross those boundaries because it is not just our issue,” he said. “Hate crime affects pretty much everyone.”

The Day Against Hate vigil is scheduled to take place on the steps of Vancouver City Hall on October 23 at 5:30 p.m. According to Clayton, Mayor Gregor Robertson, Coun. Ellen Woodsworth, and MLAs Shane Simpson and Mable Elmore plan on attending.

A separate vigil to end homophobic bullying is scheduled for Wednesday (October 20). It will take place at Emery Barnes Park (Davie Street at Richards Street) at 5:30 p.m.

You can follow Travis Lupick on Twitter at twitter.com/tlupick.